All this talk about the profoundly gifted and what they need... (principal, profession)

[tilli]

False. Many of the elite companies are a meritocracy, not a bureaucracy where the older employees always trump the younger ones. If the subordinate is right and the manager is wrong, that is the way it is.

Tell that to the crew of Challenger. They died because NASA politics prevailed over the loud protests of the engineers who knew it was a bad plan to launch at such low temperatures. Meritocracy is all fine and good in theory, but only the most well-adjusted, socially developed gifted will be able to head companies. The ones who never have to deal with normal people and wind up living cloistered lives in the test bed are examples of program failure, not success. In my opinion.

[Ivorytickler]

Originally Posted by tilli

LOL, exactly the opposite. The day I stopped giving a damn what they thought and decided that I would be bullied no more was the day that they left me alone and never bothered me again. I am not stereotyping, I am relating real examples from my childhood gifted program. What insulting terminology? "Eggheads?" That is what we called ourselves, I don't consider it an insult, why do you? Those of you who insist on scolding me for not being sensitive enough to the needs of the gifted, are you actually gifted yourselves and defending your honor, or have you just taken this role onto yourself? Just curious.

Bullies lose their power if you don't care what they say. One strategy is to turn their taunts into a joke. If you laugh with them, they have no power over you. It is their desire to make you cry.

[msm_teacher]

Originally Posted by Ivorytickler

Bullies lose their power if you don't care what they say. One strategy is to turn their taunts into a joke. If you laugh with them, they have no power over you. It is their desire to make you cry.

Sounds great in theory. Few children actually have the capacity to think so clearly in the middle of a situation. Some children, especially ASD children (like my son, who is also gifted and has a very very high IQ) are incapable of reading body language and hidden meaning. They have to be deliberately taught to deal with bullies and given safe opportunities to practice.

And, by the way, any adult who deliberately allows a child to be embarrassed to prove a point is a bully, too.

[Ivorytickler]

Originally Posted by msm_teacher

Sounds great in theory. Few children actually have the capacity to think so clearly in the middle of a situation. Some children, especially ASD children (like my son, who is also gifted and has a very very high IQ) are incapable of reading body language and hidden meaning. They have to be deliberately taught to deal with bullies and given safe opportunities to practice.

And, by the way, any adult who deliberately allows a child to be embarrassed to prove a point is a bully, too.

Fortunately, I don't know any adults who allow children to be embarassed by others to prove a point.

Again, I didn't say EVERYONE is capable of doing this. It's simply one way to deal with a bully. Turn it into a joke. If you don't get upset, they lose their power. Their power is found in us caring what they think. Once they figure out you don't, they go on to their next victim. If there's nothing in it for the bully, they move on. Unfortunately, this is not a tactic your son can use. He'll have to rely on others you teach him or others to witness and stop the bullying.

[jps-teacher]

Originally Posted by Ivorytickler

Bullies lose their power if you don't care what they say. One strategy is to turn their taunts into a joke. If you laugh with them, they have no power over you. It is their desire to make you cry.

You act as if words are the only tools bullies have at their disposal.

Perhaps as a girl, that was the only bullying you experienced - though I know plenty of women and girls who've been bullied physically as well.

But yes, Ivory, physical bullying takes place, too. No amount of ignoring their words takes away their power to lock you in a gym locker, trip you as you walk down the hallway, dump your books into the snow, or countless other indignities or hurts. And that list skips the far more overt punches and pokes, stealing of homework, and other things which go beyond inconvenience.

It also ignores all the research on the long term consequences of bullying on self-esteem and on adult functioning.

And it ignores the fact that there are bullies in the adult work place as well, many times in positions of power (or authority, as you would have it), and therefore can go far far beyond your weak imaginings.

*sigh*

I said this before - it got repeated. Maybe this time you will actually do it:
Read the research on bullying and its effects, because YOU DO NOT KNOW WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT.

[msm_teacher]

Originally Posted by psr13

I really want to know where everyone is getting the idea that separation for gifted kids will inevitably lead to bullying. My district has GATE classes at two schools. Each school had one GATE class per grade. The one my sister went to was actually at one of the poorest schools in the districts with a huge gang problem. They weren't completely separated and had recess and lunch with the other kids. She said they were not teased by the other kids. For the last few months of fourth grade I actually attended the other school in the district that had GATE classes, even though I was in the average class. I actually didn't know there was a GATE class for the first month or so. The kids just played with all the other kids during recess and lunch. It wasn't an issue at all.

It would be great to know the whole story of HOW these wonderful environments were created. That sounds so ideal. Based on my experiences as an education professional, mother and gifted student in a program like GATES (it was IB) I have to think that there was more than just children (from any class) automatically being so accepting. Do you remember the teachers ever doing anything specifically to promote acceptance? Or maybe it was something in the way the program was implemented. Anyway, it sounds fantastic!

Your post also made me think of something else that happened to me growing up. We talk about gifted children being bullied by the non-gifted. In fact, I was bullied by other gifted children in the IB program. The students I met outside of the program ended up being my friends.

[tilli]

the attitude (in this case, implied) that a gifted individual who never "learns to shut up" somehow deserves to be bullied.

Of course they don't deserve it. But they will never be free of it until they learn that there is a time and place for everything. Exactly how do you expect the gifted to not be bullied? What should they do, speaking practically? They can learn when to shut up and stop painting a target on themselves, or they can learn to fight. I'm not a fighter, I just want people to let me be. The suggestion to turn comedian probably works for normal kids who are being bullied, but I couldn't joke my way out of a paper bag at that age. The things I find hilarious usually elicit a blank stare.

I could never censor myself, especially b/c I was intimidated by someone who was jealous or spiteful of my intelligence. Moreover, I believe in tolerance and diversity rather than conformity and censorship. I could never be somone I'm not, even if it meant that my life would be much easier. But then, I always did have a lot of disdain for sell-outs

Again, this is exactly backwards. When I resist the urge to make jokes or geeky references or use vocabulary that most people will not understand, that isn't selling out, it's being savvy about your audience. Normal people do not like to feel bewildered and uncomfortable, and that is how they feel when you go over their heads. Some of them get angry and aggressive, they think you are making fun of them somehow. I don't like to have those sorts of encounters, and I can prevent them by considering for a moment before I speak. Some things are better left unsaid.

When you keep it to yourself, you can enjoy your thought without upsetting others. You can share it later with like-minded friends or your spouse or your blog or simply examine it privately. Empathy for others is something that many gifted lack and must learn if they want to lead a happy life without feeling like a persecuted freak. The gifted tend to completely devalue those of normal intelligence, not understanding that everyone has gifts - everyone has talents. At least that was true of the ones in my program, I have always thought it was a product of the constant "you are sooooo special!!!" smoke blowing. Our talents do not make us more important than other people, and our talents are not always the most valuable to have in any situation. Normal people know things that I don't. They have practical knowledge, social skills, and general wisdom that it would benefit me to pick up. There is something to be learned from almost everyone, and you won't learn it if you peeve off everyone you meet. When you learn to value other people, you don't want to cause them to feel bad, and you take steps to prevent that and like magic they will almost always treat you well in turn. This is something that normal people seem to know instinctively, but something that I had to learn. Many of my private thoughts tend towards the brutally honest and voicing them could be hurtful to others, which means that voicing them is also hurtful to me. What goes around comes around.

In any given encounter, there is an opportunity to make a new friend, to learn something new, to appreciate a different angle. An opportunity to enrich my life and the life of the person I interact with. Not every encounter needs to be me baring my innermost thoughts to random strangers, and many gifted simply do not have that ability to self-censor, as once I did not. I am very thankful to have learned it, because it has made my life much easier. I am happy instead of suicidal.

So you can go ahead and keep judging me for adapting to the world instead of waiting for it to change for me, but if I had never learned that trick I doubt I would be here today. Being hated and bullied just for being yourself is horrible, something I would not wish even upon the kids that once did it to me. Being accepted and smiled at and treated like a fellow human is much better, and how other people treat me is inextricably tied with how they perceive that I am treating them.

[Aconite]

Originally Posted by tilli

You have to learn to deal with that sooner or later. In my opinion, sooner is better.

Learn to deal with unpleasant people? Sure. Though I submit that the best way to deal with unpleasant people is to avoid them-- something not possible when their gym locker is over yours or they're assigned the next seat in art class.
The schoolchild who is being bullied by a peer in a classroom situation really has no parallel in the adult world. As adults, little Isabella won't likely be forced to dress next to her tormentor, or routinely be tripped in the hallways at work, or face coworkers who call her "stupid <insert racial/sexual epithet> ho" on a daily basis. And if it happens, she has far more legal recourse than she did at eight or ten or twelve, where telling the teacher generally resulted in being told "oh, they're just teasing, they want to be your friend" or "just ignore them". (We see how well that worked at Walker Middle School in Tampa, or Sawgrass Lake and Azalea Middle in St Pete, or with Jeffrey Johnston or Megan Meier.)
http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/06/04/...ult/index.html
http://www.tampabay.com/news/educati...wsuits/1051160

Additionally, the whole "may as well learn it now" argument is a pretty silly one. We don't teach our fourth graders to pay taxes or do BSEs, we don't give them the car keys or teach them to mix the perfect martini on the theory that "they may as well learn it now". Yet with verbal and physical abuse, as long as the person inflicting them is an age-peer (because if it's an adult, it's potentially actionable as child abuse), all bets are off?

[Ivorytickler]

Originally Posted by Aconite

Learn to deal with unpleasant people? Sure. But the schoolchild who is being bullied by a peer in a classroom situation really has no parallel in the adult world. As adults, little Isabellawon't likely be routinely tripped in the hallways at work, or face coworkers who call her "stupid <insert racial/sexual epithet> ho". And if it happens, she has far more legal recourse than she did at eight, where telling the teacher generally resulted in being told "oh, they're just teasing, they want to be your friend".

Additionally, the whole "may as well learn it now" argument is a pretty silly one. We don't teach our fourth graders to pay taxes or do BSEs, we don't give them the car keys or teach them to mix the perfect martini on the theory that "they may as well learn it now". Yet with verbal and physical abuse, as long as the person inflicting them is an age-peer (because if it's an adult, it's potentially actionable as child abuse), all bets are off?

I don't think anyone is advocating no adult intervention. They're, simply, pointing out that handling the situation by avoiding it means the person never learns to deal with bullying and it does happen in the adult world. I have worked with more than one bully. In the adult world they take the form of the back stabbing, get ahead no matter who you step on type. I once had one threaten to go to upper management about me because I wouldn't drop everything to see to a problem he should have brought to my attention weeks earlier. I threatened to take him to human resources on charges of sexual harassment/discrimination (it had been noticed, by others, that he did not talk to men the way he talked to me, however, I'm convinced it was just that he's a jerk and I had the power to help him out and refused not my gender but you fight fire with fire.)

As a teacher, if I witness bullying, I'm obligated to stop it and report the bully. Adults also need to help children being bullied learn how to deal with bullying so they can handle the situations when there is no adult around to help.

Childhood is training for adulthood. Not all lessons are taught at the same time. We DO teach our children do to taxes when they get jobs. We DO teach our children to drive cars when they're old enough for a permit. Each thing is handled in it's own time. Bullying is one you want to handle early because the longer you take to deal with it, the more years of bullying the child will put up with. Driving a car and doing taxes can wait because there are no repercussions for not knowing them in 4th grade. There can be, serious, issues with not knowing how to deal with a bully in the 4th grade. It's definitely one to learn earlier than later.

[msm_teacher]

Originally Posted by jps-teacher

You act as if words are the only tools bullies have at their disposal.

Perhaps as a girl, that was the only bullying you experienced - though I know plenty of women and girls who've been bullied physically as well.

But yes, Ivory, physical bullying takes place, too. No amount of ignoring their words takes away their power to lock you in a gym locker, trip you as you walk down the hallway, dump your books into the snow, or countless other indignities or hurts. And that list skips the far more overt punches and pokes, stealing of homework, and other things which go beyond inconvenience.

It also ignores all the research on the long term consequences of bullying on self-esteem and on adult functioning.

And it ignores the fact that there are bullies in the adult work place as well, many times in positions of power (or authority, as you would have it), and therefore can go far far beyond your weak imaginings.

*sigh*

I said this before - it got repeated. Maybe this time you will actually do it:
Read the research on bullying and its effects, because YOU DO NOT KNOW WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT.

JPS's quote was in reply to someone else, but it got me thinking.


I wonder if this needs to be addressed more specifically in teacher training programs? I am currently working on my master of education and have never had a class address bully issues head on. It has been refered to several times, as in "don't let it happen". All my own professional knowledge has been because I sought out information and experts to help my own child. Maybe we need to add proof of having that knowledge to the definition of highly qualified. Make it part of a required course in non-academic issues we need to effectively deal with.